In Bagnacavallo, Ettore Frani's works reflect on man's identity in the cosmos

Until Nov. 10, 2024, theEx Convento di San Francesco in Bagnacavallo is hosting the exhibition Ettore Frani. Toward Joy, curated by Paola Feraiorni and Massimo Pulini, promoted by the Municipality of Bagnacavallo and organized by the Museo Civico delle Cappuccine on the occasion of the Feast of St. Michael.

The exhibition represents the culmination of an intense and in-depth reflection developed in the last three years of Ettore Frani ’s (Termoli, 1978) artistic research. The artist, in addition to exploring some of the central themes and subjects of his poetics, offers a series of new works, many of them created specifically for the spaces of the former convent of San Francesco. The exhibition includes eighty works on paper, more than forty paintings and, for the first time, five pictorial installations. The works range from graphite drawing, made on several layers of overlapping paper, to oil painting on lacquered board. Prominent among them are the five installations titled Offer, where the artist uses materials that are unusual for his path but rich in symbolic meaning, such as stones, dust, ashes, glass, notebooks, rags and brushes.

The title of the exhibition draws inspiration from a series of Frani’s recent works, focused not so much on a state of being as on a journey, a tension toward a goal in which suffering dissolves into joy and shadow is transformed into light. The exhibition begins with the large composition Di polvere e luce, consisting of sixty-four drawings, and culminates with the oil polyptych Verso la gioia, which gives the exhibition its title. This work, exhibited at the Capuchin Museum as early as 2022, has been reworked especially for the occasion.

In the eight rooms and two corridors of the former convent, Frani stages many of the pivotal themes of his poetics, such as the human figure, landscape, and still life, using them as tools to probe and interrogate the unspeakable “Beyond.” The exhibition itinerary, conceived as a polyphonic score, is divided into four "landscapes," Di polvere e luce, Nel sguardo, Nel silenzio and Verso la gioia. The viewer is invited to active and contemplative listening. The works are never presented in isolation, but always in dialogue with each other, through cross-references and resonances, guiding the visitor’s gaze and emotion toward an intimate and personal reflection on life, essence and human identity in the cosmos, themes central to Frani’s poetics.

A section of the exhibition, entitled Luminosa, is set up in the spaces of the Diocesan Museum in Faenza.

The exhibition is realized with the support of Hera Group.

For info: www.museocivicobagnacavallo.it

Hours: Thursday and Friday from 5 to 9 p.m.; Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to noon and 4 to 7 p.m.

In Bagnacavallo, Ettore Frani's works reflect on man's identity in the cosmos

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